


A different day

by weirdindeed



Category: Free!
Genre: A Bit of Fluff, Angst, First Kiss, Like have fun hurting yourself while reading this, Lots of Angst Actually, M/M, Unrequited Love, gomene, hiyori suffers, i can't stand hiyori but i feel sorry for writing this, sorry hiyori
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-17
Updated: 2018-08-17
Packaged: 2019-06-28 21:58:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15715899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/weirdindeed/pseuds/weirdindeed
Summary: It could have been a different day.But it wasn't.





	A different day

**Author's Note:**

> I know it's a pretty short story, but I had this image in my mind that just wouldn't go away and I had never wrote anything in English before (I'm Italian) and I don't write fanfictions since like 2012 maybe, so forgive any mistakes or stuff that doesn't quite sound right, I just NEEDED to get this off my mind. Now I should feel better. I don't. Have fun, leave a comment if you want, I would love to read them.

It could have been a dull day, Hiyori thought to himself, jumping on a busy bus on the way to his apartment. It could have been a dull day indeed, full of dullness and dull things, full of his beloved routine and all the familiarity that came with it, full of the same good things that he had carefully placed into every day to make them easy enough to survive. But it wasn’t a dull day.

All thanks to good old Nanase-kun, who came out of nowhere just to destroy everything that he had carefully built all those damned years. What for? Why? Who gave him any permission to do that? Who did he think he was? Hiyori held himself stronger to the handrail, biting his lower lip nervously, his mind tormented by unanswered questions.

He still couldn’t believe what he had witnessed just a couple hours before, into the locker room of the swim club. If somebody that morning had warned him about what was going to happen just a bit later that evening, he would have honestly laughed. Now he just wanted to scream.

“Ikuya?”

He had been looking for him into the halls of the college first, since he was supposed to attend a lesson until five, just to hear from one of his classmates that he had rushed out in the middle of it, running like crazy. Something unusual to hear and unusual to imagine. Unless…

“Ikuya!”

He had then searched into the pools area, where some of the guys of the team were still practicing. The setting sun projected a bloody light onto the water, agitated by the people swimming in it. There was an odd atmosphere.

He asked the guys about Ikuya, but nobody had seen him, apparently. Another unusual thing.

The last place to look into, before heading to his house, since he wasn’t answering the phone nor the messages, was the locker room. Hiyori walked all the way to it, a bad feeling growing inside him at every step, the urge to see with his own two eyes that Ikuya was well and _alone_ , the need to feel him at his side on the way home, to hear his voice, to perceive his restless thoughts.

Once in front of it, before entering it, having noticed that the door was – unusually, another unusual thing to add to that annoyingly unusual afternoon – closed, he got close to it, trying to get a hold of the conversation happening inside between, apparently, two people. One of the which seemed to be Ikuya. Not long after he had placed his ear on the door though, a loud noise came from inside, like something had been thrown to one of the lockers. His curiosity and his caution would have been stronger if, just a couple of seconds later, he hadn’t heard Ikuya’s voice making a clear discomfort noise.

So he opened the door.

 

 

-         -         -

 

 

It could have been a bad day, Haruka thought to himself, walking home from Ikuya’s college, waiting for the train. One of those where you don’t look into other people’s eyes, nor their faces, nor any part of their bodies, and you just wish you disappeared into nothingness. But it wasn’t a bad day.

It must have been around four when, going back home from practice, he had seen Ikuya’s scarf in front of a book shop. Haruka was sure it was his scarf, since Ikuya was still clearly visible just some steps further the shop, walking away. His first thought, after obviously picking it up, was to run to him to give it back. But he didn’t. He wasn’t sure why, after all that obsessive glasses guy that seemed to follow him around 24 hours a day wasn’t nowhere to be seen. Also, Ikuya didn’t seem to be in a bad mood, quite the contrary actually, judging by the carefree way he was walking. It would have been the perfect time to talk to him without any interruptions. Instead Haruka remained many steps behind him, but enough to keep him in sight.

He followed him all the way to his college, where he waited for him to get into class. Then, reassured by the continued absence of the glasses guy, he went near one of the windows of the hall and waved the scarf a bit, trying to catch Ikuya’s attention. Luckily one of his classmates tapped his shoulder, making him notice Haruka, that hinted a smile when he met the green haired boy’s eyes.

Ikuya froze. Then touched his neck. Then blushed. Then grabbed his stuff and rushed out. All in the span of, maybe, five seconds.

Haruka waited for him at the entrance of the college, still holding the scarf with both hands.

“Hey”, Ikuya greeted him, slightly panting, taking a look at the scarf. Then added “Thanks. I realized that I was late for class and it must have slipped from my bag.”

“It’s alright.” He answered, handing him the scarf. “You’re not going back inside?”, Haruka asked, since the other didn’t seem willing to head back to class.

Ikuya blinked a couple times, turning his head to get a look at the building behind him. Then he shrugged.

“It’s nothing that I haven’t already studied. I went just because I had nothing better to do. I already practiced this morning.”

Haruka nodded sympathetically. He couldn’t stop looking at Ikuya. He was studying his face and his body after so many years without seeing him. He definitely looked more fit, but his figure was still slim and kind of soft, almost. He also looked very tired.

“I guess you want to talk.” Ikuya hinted after a while of them just staring at each other.

“I do,” he paused, taking a step closer to the other, “do you?”

Ikuya’s lips curved in a faint, tender smile. He also took a step closer.

“I’m asking myself this question since the day we met on the street…” He walked past Haruka, pointing at the covered pools not far from there. “Do you mind talking there?”

Haruka didn’t answer, simply moving towards the building, hands in his pockets, a chilly wind playing with his black hair. Ikuya followed him. Once inside, Ikuya went straight for the locker rooms, Haruka just behind him, wondering about the best way to start the talking since he absolutely didn’t wish for Ikuya to feel more uneasiness than he clearly was already feeling. Ikuya waited for the other to walk inside then closed the door, abandoning his bag and the scarf on one of the benches. He glanced at Haruka in a way that the latter didn’t quite know how to interpret: he didn’t look upset, nor sad, but at the same time he seemed… worried? Anxious? Haruka couldn’t tell.

“So?”

Ikuya’s hands started trembling. At first it was just barely visible, then the trembling grew so much that he hid his arms behind his back, leaning on one of the lockers. He was still looking at Haruka. The black haired boy cleared his throat, leaving his bag on a bench as well, getting closer – but not too much - to the other. It was hard to look at him. He looked almost frightened now.

“I’m sorry” as trivial as it sounded, Haruka couldn’t think of a better way to start the conversation. “I know what you think I’m referring to, but it’s not just that.” Ikuya kept on staring at him, in an almost painful way. “It’s also for the years I haven’t looked for you, for the silence, for having made you think I had forgotten you—“

“You hadn’t?” Ikuya interrupted. Just a feeble whisper, his eyes big and full of… hope? Haruka lost himself in that stare for a bit before continuing, firmly.

“I hadn’t. I’ve never stopped thinking about…” Suddenly, it was hard to talk. Haruka felt the weight of his own thoughts, the burning feeling that was a mix of embarrass and shame and something else - fluster? – that had accompanied the image of Ikuya on which he had so often focused over the years. “… you.”

Ikuya winced, lowering his eyes at their feet. Now he was literally shivering.

“Ikuya…” Hearing his name whispered in such a sweet way, the green haired boy winced once again. Then he went back to lose himself in Haruka’s deep blue stare. “Are you alright?”

“Please keep talking”, at that point Ikuya was basically a shivering mess. It was hard not to want to hold him and hide him from every bad thing in the world.

“I know I haven’t been the best of friends and that many years have passed. I know you suffered, and I’m sorry for that too. For that, most of all”, it was so _hard_ to talk, “But I…” he swallowed, feeling his mouth dry, “I want another chance. I still want to swim with you, to race you. I want to…” Haruka thought he heard steps approaching the door. But then nothing happened and Ikuya looked on the verge of crying, so he continued. “… have you back.”

Then, suddenly, his mouth was covered by Ikuya’s. His neck had the other’s arms around it and he couldn’t feel anything else besides his delicate, gentle scent. There had to be some kind of earthquake going on, or else he didn’t know how to explain the dizziness he was feeling. Completely lost in the kiss, that was rushed and unsure but full of feeling, Haruka pinned the other to a locker, maybe too roughly, but the sound Ikuya made seemed everything but unhappy about it, so he just kept on savouring his lips, enjoying their softness. He was keeping Ikuya’s hands above his head in a way that would have looked like he was threatening him if somebody had seen it from the outside.

Then, the unpredictable. The catastrophe.

The door opened.

“What the—“

Hiyori’s voice reminded him of an approaching moray, crawling out of its damned hole to look for something to devour.

 

 

-         -         -    

 

 

It could have been a productive day. One of those days where you get home tired but satisfied, kind of happy, kind of proud. Kind of glad you still haven’t succeeded in killing yourself by drowning. But it wasn’t a productive day.

Ikuya had spent all his morning going from one side of the pool to the other, tireless, restless, deaf to his coach warnings not to overdo it. For once he was genuinely focused on his goal, he was genuinely not thinking about any blue eyes. He was just swimming. “ _Just keep swimming, just keep swimming_ ” sang a metaphoric Dory inside his head. A Dory that had Natsuya’s face, for some reason.

He then thought that before his afternoon class it could have been a good idea to go taking a look at the books in his favourite book shop, to maybe read some bits of those poems books he was starting to like but was too busy to actually enjoy if he had bought them.

It wasn’t a really cold day, but he had forgotten to take a look at the weather forecast that morning, so he had carried with him his scarf, that at two in the afternoon was definitely too much to wear. So he had laid it on his bag, keeping a hand on it, wandering between the shelves and the hundreds of coloured books that winked in his way. Then, too lost in a beautiful photography book of cliffs, he had lost track of the time and, hearing somebody say “It’s already four!”, he had rushed out of the shop, leaving the scarf behind him. Then he had seen Haruka out of the window of his class with his scarf in one hand and he hadn’t thought twice that it had to be some destiny’s sign.

While the black haired boy was talking to him in the locker room, he could feel his heart close to explode in his chest, beating so fast that his body was almost shaking at the same rhythm. Everything was just too absurd to be true. And nobody was there to interrupt them, finally. It had to be a dream of some kind, maybe an hallucination. Maybe he was reading some light novel in the book shop.

Ikuya hadn’t realized how much he had always wanted to kiss Haruka until he did it. He hadn’t thought much about it before doing it, nothing along the line “maybe I should think twice about this before of actually doing it”, nothing. He suddenly felt everything that he had always tried to tell himself he didn’t feel, he sensed himself drowning in the tallest wave that had ever hit him. A wave of something he just couldn’t name, but he knew, somewhere inside him, he cared deeply about. Something he wanted to keep and to feel again.

Then a loud noise, a familiar voice. A painfully familiar voice.

“What the—“

Hiyori was standing between the door and the locker room, his face a mask of shock and distress.

Then, in a second, Haruka was the one being pinned against a locker, but in an even rougher way than what Ikuya had been pinned a bit before, with Hiyori’s hands holding him still.

“What the hell were you doing to Ikuya?!” The glasses boy shouted to Haruka, shaking him a couple times.

Before the black haired had any time to respond to that, Ikuya grabbed Hiyori by his shoulders and literally shoved him away from him. Hiyori was shocked. Most of all he seemed hurt.

“Ikuya…?” He murmured, confused. He looked like a wounded animal.

“How dare you—“ Haruka tried to stop Ikuya from continuing by gently grabbing one of his wrists, but it was already too late. The green haired boy put a hand on the black haired boy’s chest in a protective way, half turned in his direction, “How dare you touch him like that? How dare you act like you know everything?? How dare you put yourself between us like this?!” Haruka tried to calm him down by caressing his back. Hiyori’s eyes focused on that detail, an expression of pure horror growing on his face.

“I thought he was—“

“What? You thought he was what? Hitting me? We were fucking kissing Hiyori, we were…” Ikuya suddenly realised what he just said and remained silent, violently blushing, holding onto Haruka’s shirt. He stopped looking at the glasses boy and started slightly trembling again. Hiyori’s face at that point was just desperate.

“What… Why were you two…? What are you implying, Ikuya…?” Haruka wasn’t sure he was talking to anybody in particular. Hiyori looked like he was somewhere else completely.

“Let’s go, Haru. I’m sick of this” Ikuya grabbed Haruka’s hand, trying to get him to collect his stuff and get out of the locker room. But Haruka’s eyes were fixed on Hiyori’s figure, that looked as if he was about to faint.

Feeling the other not moving, Ikuya stood still for a couple of seconds, shot a deadly glance at Hiyori, then ran out shutting the door. Haruka was sure he wasn’t mad at him, so he didn’t worry too much about it. Instead he tried to get close to the glasses boy to make him sit on one of the benches. He was genuinely worried he was going to faint right there. But when he lifted a hand in his direction, Hiyori shouted once again.

“Don’t fucking touch me!!”

The black haired boy blinked, staring at the other.

“You’re a lot of fun, you know, Nanase-kun? A lot of fun indeed, for fuck’s sake”, he sat down, for Haru’s joy, “You disappear into the void for YEARS, then you pop out of nowhere, suddenly caring about what you’ve left behind, and you claim a place that’s not yours anymore”, he panted. He looked like he was in the middle of a panic attack. “Do you hear me? That place _is. not. yours. anymore._ Or at least it shouldn’t be, since it looks like it fucking still is, but you know what? Who cares about the little mermaid, right? You’re the one who saved him, the one who inspired him, the one he kept on dreaming and crying about, _the one_ , it simply is you. What can I say? Do I at least have the right to be bitter about it? To feel _shattered_ about it? 'Cause that’s exactly what I’m feeling, if you want to know. I’m the one that collected the pieces of what you broke, the one that heard him calling your name in his sleep and while we were _fucking_ , but who cares, right? You’re the one. I’m the other one. The unlucky one. The one who turns into foam in the end. Then let it be foam, if that’s all I am.”

Haruka would have loved to have something to say in response to all that. But he had nothing to say. Probably the thing that shook him the most, the fact the he and Ikuya had been – _what?_ – fucking?, wasn’t supposed to be the one upsetting him more than the others. But Hiyori didn’t seem to talk about their situation like he and Ikuya were a couple, so maybe it had just been a one night stand. Haruka hoped so - for many reasons.

“I give up. Are you happy? I'm going back to the cold sea where I belong. Hope you two are fucking happy now.”

Hiyori quitted the locker room as well, leaving Haruka alone with a storm of unpleasant thoughts.

 

 

-         -         -

 

 

When after a while Haruka reached Ikuya outside the building, it was dark and colder than before. Ikuya had his face buried in his scarf.

“Do you mind walking me home?” The green haired boy looked calmer and way more tired than before.

“Where is it?” Haruka looked for Ikuya’s fingers. The other boy intertwined them with his.

“Twenty minutes walking from here. Actually, never mind, I don’t want to bother y—“

“Let’s go”

They held hands for all the way there. They didn’t talk, both of them lost in their respective thoughts. Once in front of the complex of buildings reserved for college students, Ikuya searched for the key, turning to the other once he found it. He smiled tenderly.

“See you around then”

“See you, Ikuya”

They leaned for a kiss at the same moment. This time it was chaste and slow, just their lips touching for a while, their breaths held, their bodies stiff. When they separated, their faces had both a reddish colour. And a smile.

 

 

 

-         -         -

 

 

 

Hiyori got back home after many hours from what had happened in the locker room. He needed some time to cool his head and to let out all his frustration. When he did, he simply let himself collapse on the bed without even removing his shoes nor his coat, his glasses sliding from his face in a messy way.

There was nothing else to do, except to accept all of that. Which was nearly impossible, all things considered. How could he ever accept that? Things looked so much easier from every perspective besides his own.

He pulled out his phone from his pants, mentally mad at himself for wasting so many hours, then closed his eyes, letting all kinds of images slide in a slow sequence.

He was inside deep water, surrounded by small, brightly coloured fishes. He also had a tail, a green one, and was swimming around freely, singing a nostalgic melody. After a while he saw a sunk ship on the bottom of the water. He got close, entered it, exploring its surroundings. There were all kinds of objects around, from bottles to jewels to clothes, but he knew exactly what he was looking for. There was a statue at the centre of a big room, that maybe someday had been a fancy ballroom, of a beautiful and young prince. He approached it, sitting into his lap, caressing his face.

“My sweet prince… you are the one…”

He loved that song, almost as much as he loved Ikuya.

 

_

 

It could have been a different day.

 _But it wasn’t_.


End file.
